Opinion category, Page 609
Letter to the editor: Transparency needed on prescriptions
I hope that state Rep. Natalie Mihalek is correct that pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs) improve the flow and efficiency for the sale of prescriptions (“Anticipated drug shortages highlight need for health care industry collaboration,” Aug. 11, TribLIVE). We could have more confidence in that if we knew where the money...
Paul Kengor: How Biden’s pick of Kamala Harris hurts him in Pa.
I was really surprised that Joe Biden picked Kamala Harris as his running mate. I thought he would choose Susan Rice, a safe pick, genuinely moderate, measured, considerable experience in foreign policy, not a lightning rod. Harris is divisive and elicits anger. She hurts Biden where he needs help the...
Lori Falce: Facts, ideas and watching TV with mom
Because my mother is a nurse, I have spent years having my television and movie viewing punctuated by huffing and heckling. “Those bed rails would never be like that.” “They would never inject that in a bicep.” “That’s not how you draw blood.” I may have rolled my eyes a...
Wayne Gilchrest: Republican senators want to kill health care and now Social Security and Medicare?
Now Republicans are coming after Social Security and Medicare with President Trump’s signature on an executive order that slashes the funding for these two programs. When I served as a Republican member of Congress, we helped thousands of constituents who had problems receiving their Social Security checks or trouble with...
Earl Tilford: Confessions of a draft dodger
Next month I turn 75. The ubiquitous “they” tell me I’m on a covid-19 “endangered species” list. Fifty years from October, with my 25th birthday behind me, I boarded a plane in Miami and headed for the other side of the world. I really was not in much danger, and...
Letter to the editor: Peduto should focus on crime, not police
It upsets me that the mayor of Pittsburgh is criticizing the “pop out arrest” by the Pittsburgh police, instead of defending and praising them (“Mayor Peduto, Pittsburgh public safety leaders address protest arrest in Oakland,” Aug. 16, TribLIVE). He instead should direct the focus on the criminal acts that were...
Letter to the editor: Grenell opening doors for gay Republicans
I’ve watched documentaries accusing the Reagan administration of being reluctant to take AIDS head on. People say it was because of the stigma regarding the population it mostly affected: Gay people like me and Richard Grenell. Whether that was the case or not at the time, it was unpopular to...
Letter to the editor: Responsible adults, irresponsible actions
It is with great dismay that I write to express how horrible it is to have two cases of insensitive, racist, conspiratorial, biased postings on social media locally by two supposedly responsible adults charged with making decisions and policies for the good of students. Pittsburgh Public Schools Superintendent Anthony Hamlet...
Editorial: Amazon’s big paydays mean Pittsburgh paychecks
No one is making money during the coronavirus pandemic like Amazon. While people were staying home amid lockdowns in recent months, the world’s largest retailer has been sitting pretty by filling the voids of in-person shopping. Can’t run out and buy a new video game? Amazon can have it to...
Letter to the editor: Pro-lifer plans to vote for Joe Biden
I have been pro-life since I could vote. I have never voted for a Democratic presidential nominee. From Bush to Dole to Bush to Bush to McCain to Romney to Trump, I’ve voted for them all. I hold Christian values dear to my heart. Those values are the cornerstone of...
Letter to the editor: Trump, Biden and China
Joe Biden is a friend of China and vice versa. China has been stealing technology from us for years and has been fleecing Americans on trade. Then Donald Trump came on the scene. In my opinion, the three previous presidents did nothing to level the playing field with China, and...
Jonah Goldberg: Birtherism makes unwelcome return in 2020 race
The Birtherism 2.0 brouhaha began the way so many do. A Trump sycophant, in this case Trump campaign lawyer Jenna Ellis, handed the president a hot-take opinion piece as if it was breaking news. Mere hours later at a press conference, he acted as if that op-ed was a settled...
Letter to the editor: Trump has kept his promises
I detest and certainly distrust most politicians. I strongly believe that any politician who has been in office for more than two terms is corrupt and will not change. With that said, I must admit that I have in the past voted for some of these lowlifes. I am ashamed...
Letter to the editor: Pa. must get out of liquor business
I applaud the Aug. 14 political cartoon by Tim Hartman addressing a question I have asked any number of Pennsylvania representatives: Why should Pennsylvania be one of only two states that continue to sell liquor? I have never been given one good reason for it other than my most hated...
Letter to the editor: Trump and his perfect hair
Just when you think you’ve heard it all from President Trump, now he wants to change the water flow regulation on shower heads. Quote: “Because my hair — I don’t know about you, but it has to be perfect.” Never mind about the 170,000 dead from the virus — he...
Letter to the editor: Father Martin Bartel more than ‘numbers guy’
The veiled criticism of the Rev. Martin de Porres Bartel, newly elected archabbot of Saint Vincent Archabbey, as a “numbers guy” indicates that the letter-writer does not know the man we know and love (“Numbers guys making the decisions,” Aug. 3, TribLIVE). He may have degrees in law, business administration,...
Editorial: Keeping the U.S. Postal Service an essential service
People talk a lot about what built America. Legislators. Presidents. Soldiers and settlers. Farmers and business, teachers and explorers. None of that is wrong. It does, however, neglect the element that connects them all. Communication. Specifically, the mail. When the original 13 states were just colonies, the first cities of...
Letter to the editor: ‘JoKa’ sounds like a winning ticket
I don’t understand why “JoKa” has not been promulgated among the media and Hollywood crowd for the recently selected Democratic ticket. It’s been almost a week, and Twitter hasn’t picked up on this new word. It makes for a great play on words in English. It was a hit movie...
Letter to the editor: Steigerwald’s opinion on canceling sports
In his column “High school athletes don’t need Gov. Wolf to keep them safe” (Aug. 9, TribLIVE), Tribune-Review contributing writer John Steigerwald chose to cherry-pick information and give an opinion based on no attributable facts. In a Sports news article concerning Gov. Tom Wolf’s “recommendation” that all high school sports...
Scott Martelle: Trump’s push to expand Arctic drilling is dangerous and foolhardy
Finishing a task that a Republican-controlled Congress gave it three years ago, the Trump administration has finalized plans for new oil and gas leases in one of the most pristine stretches of the world: the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. It’s a manifestly bad idea that Congress was wrong to slip...
Pat Buchanan: The progressive racism of the Ivy League
If the definition of racism is deliberate discrimination based on race, color or national origin, Yale University appears to be a textbook case of “systemic racism.” And, so, the Department of Justice contends. Last week, Assistant Attorney General Eric Dreiband charged, “Yale discriminates based on race … in its undergraduate...
Kelton Edmonds: Shadows of Charlottesville
Three years ago this month, the world witnessed extremely disturbing images emerge out of Charlottesville, Va. as Unite the Right protesters marched through the University of Virginia’s campus, holding torches and shouting ominous chants such as “Jews will Not Replace US.” Rally organizers suggested the overall goals of the marches...
Jay Urwitz: Trump administration a disaster for college students
From the moment Betsy DeVos was nominated as secretary of Education, those of us in the education field have been anxious about how the Trump administration’s policies would harm low-income college students. Our fears were justified — and then some. Yet President Trump has not singled out low-income students. His...
Letter to the editor: Highlands band ‘goes extra mile’
As I delivered mail on my route in Natrona Heights one recent Friday afternoon, I was pleasantly surprised and honored by a group of considerate, talented Highlands High School band students. Their continuous performance on the drums as they followed me and waited at each stop along one of the...
Letter to the editor: Democrats should think twice about Biden
The election for our next president is coming fast and, like it or not, the presumptive candidates are Donald Trump and Joe Biden. Therein, for the Democrats, lies a big problem: Joe Biden. He doesn’t appear to be the Biden we remember from his years as vice president, but an...
